In the earlier part of the previous century, the unconscious
was popularly perceived as a sinister place of primordial urges and internal
conflict. Lust, jealousy, failures, fears, rages, losses, secret desires and
worse were believed to be churning about in a spooky region of the mind that
starts just on the other side of our awareness. [1] Except for emergent traces
that sometimes surface from dreams, the content of the unconscious was thought
to be hidden from everyday awareness, for what would certainly have seemed
(especially in that era) good reason - it was believed that the rational,
moderating influences of the ego was all too easily overwhelmed, resulting in
actions or feelings that the conscious (but often powerless) part of the mind
would itself abhor. However, by mid-century, in no small part due to the
influence of Jung (a former member of Freud’s inner circle) and Eastern
mysticism, a growing number of writers began to attribute to the unconscious the
qualities of spirituality, liberation and wholeness rather than (or in addition
to) primal emotions and impulses. [2]

Among the general public today, the earlier, darker view of
the unconscious still seems perfectly reasonable and, ironically, almost as
comforting as it is alarming. Such an unconscious side of us could account for a
lot of the unpleasant things about human nature. After all, who does not wonder
occasionally why we find ourselves struggling with the compulsion to succumb to
what we “know” to be unhealthy or hurtful behaviors; why do we suffer from
disagreeable moods; and why we are often plagued by persistent and unpleasant
thoughts? Surely, since we would not intentionally create such disagreeableness,
it must be the product of irresistible (and even alien) unconscious forces.

In Strangers to Ourselves, Timothy Wilson offers an
assessment of the human unconscious that is very different from these extremes.
He proposes that the unconscious is neither especially wicked nor spiritual, but
rather its role is to assist us in maneuvering through our daily lives. In
Wilson’s research, the unconscious mind is shown to house the bulk of our
practical decision-making apparatus, conveniently tucked away in the back rooms
of our cognitive machinery. He convincingly argues that what this form of the
unconscious does for us is useful, adaptive, and even essential; hence his
reference to it as the adaptive unconscious. Wilson demonstrates that
this unconscious manages most of the lower-level processes that occur without
awareness, and he defines the unconscious as that set of “mental processes
that are inaccessible to consciousness but that influence judgments, feelings,
or behavior” [italics in text] (p. 23).

Nonetheless, we should not mistake the unconscious for an
assemblage of automata, mental servants or homunculi. In a chapter entitled “Who’s
in Charge?” Wilson notes that “our nonconscious minds are not just the
janitorial staff or even low-level managers” (p. 43). In fact, in addition to
resolving the simple problems of daily life, the unconscious seems to play a
central role in making important life decisions, such as what career to pursue,
what person to marry, and whether, in the heat of the moment, it is really a
good idea to point out the boss’s shortcomings in public.

We tend to assume that we are consciously in charge of our intentional
actions (despite the pressures of that primitive unconscious mentioned above).
However, Wilson explains that this is a misapprehension, referencing the recent
work of fellow psychologist Daniel Wegner [3]. “We often experience a thought
followed by an action, and assume it was the thought that caused the action”
(p. 47). However, it may be that, Wegner suggests, both the thought and
the action derive from a third, unconscious process. It is only the apparent
(consciously experienced) sequence of thought-then-act that gives us the
illusion that the thought caused the action.

Trying to figure out how our minds function can be
frustrating, both in theory (regarding the minds of others) and practice
(regarding our own individual minds). Early in Strangers, Wilson
addresses the question of why we should bother to learn about the workings of
the personal unconscious. First, nothing we now know about the unconscious
precludes the possibility that the conscious part of us can also have
some degree of control over our behavior; and second, it is likely that we can
consciously influence the workings of our unconscious (even if we usually do
not). Therefore, learning about the unconscious gives us a greater ability both
to directly effect conscious decisions and behaviors, and to harness the
unconscious processes for intentionally chosen purposes.

In order to understand and predict the workings of the
unconscious, we must learn first to perceive its influence in our lives - we
first need a way to differentiate between actions that are consciously initiated
and directed, and actions that primarily derive from unconscious processes. That
is, we need to become conscious of, to the degree possible, our “true”
motivations and our usual ways of responding to situations. By observing how we
feel and behave in a variety of different situations, we can infer who we
are and what motivates us. [4] We can intentionally engage in an adult version
of our early-childhood strategy - we can carefully observe what we do and how we
feel about and react to novel situations, and then make plausible interferences
about unconscious processes from this information.

However, there are natural limitations on the usefulness of
the inferential approach, including the self-serving bias [5]. “When it comes
to maintaining a sense of well-being,” Wilson notes, “each of us is the
ultimate spin doctor” (p. 38). How can we get around this spin doctor? First,
by developing our capacity for methodical introspection. It must be as
free as possible from the pressures of social and personal expectation, in order
to minimize bias. “The trick is to allow the feelings to surface and to see
them through the haze of one’s theories and expectations [about one’s self]”
(p. 173).

But the introspective process is necessarily limited, and our
self-understanding would be incomplete if we relied too heavily on it.
Supplementary sources of information about our unconscious processes are the
perceptions and assessments of others, with which we can compare and contrast
our self-appraisals. (However, there are two major caveats here: others may not
give us their unfiltered perceptions, and even when they do, their assessments
may be less accurate than the self-view we obtained via our introspection.)

Each of these sources of self-information will necessarily
provide only a reflection of the workings of the unconscious, of course, because
the unconscious must always remain hidden from us. Reliable guesses about our
unconscious motivations will have to suffice.

Wilson rounds out this book with a discussion of how we might
use this fuller awareness of the unconscious to our advantage. We can, for
example, act as though first and self-assess later - that is, behave in
ways that are consistent with the type of person we would wish to be, rather
than wait to be that type of person and then act like her. Wilson
explains, “‘The do good, be good’ principle is one of the most important
lessons psychology has to offer” (p. 215).

This book is written in an informative style that should be
very accessible to the general reader, yet because it is well based on research
it should also be of interest to clinicians and academics. For those interested
in mind and consciousness, this book will be a complimentary and
thought-provoking read.

Notes

1. However, it should be noted that Freud did not believe
that the unconscious performs only primitive processing, or that “higher
order” thought is restricted to the conscious mind. For example, in The
Interpretation of Dreams he observed, “the most complicated achievements
of thought are possible without the assistance of consciousness” (Pelican
Library Edition, 1976, p. 751).

2. The sinister understanding of the unconscious has
arguably had the greater influence on literature and art, especially in the
middle to late 20th century. The continuing impression this view made on
Hollywood screenwriters seems especially graphic.

Dr. Harris is a clinical psychologist and supervisor of
Victor Valley Behavioral Health Center in San Bernardino county, California. His
interests include clinical supervision, the empirical basis for psychotherapy
research (and its design), human decision-making processes, and the shaping of
human nature by evolutionary forces.